Text 4. Lake District National Park

The National Trust is a charity founded nearly 100 years ago by three people who were anxious that the natural beauty of the British countryside was not to be spoiled by the increasing industrialization of the country. Today the Trust owns around 2,400 sq. km. of land; it is the third largest landowner in the country. Its property includes famous gardens, villages, wind and watermills, lakes and mountains, abbeys and ancient ruins.

The Lake District is the largest national park in England, one quarter of the land is owned by the national trust, and with a large part of the rest owned by the Forestry Commission. As the name suggests, this region of Cumbria is dominated by its lakes. The lakes and the mountains that surround them were formed millions of years ago in the ice age. The largest lake is Windermere; this is often used for sailing, water-skiing and other sports. The deepest lake, thought to be the oldest, is Wostwater, over 60m. deep. One fairly new ‘lake’ is Hawes-water reservoir. This is a man-made lake which was created by flooding a valley. However, the valley contained a village and there are many stories of village life continuing under the lake. On stormy nights, the story goes, it is still possible to hear the church bell ringing beneath the surface.

The English lakes are a popular area for outdoor activities such as hiking, camping, climbing and water sports. It is more popular for families to visit in the summer and the only real industry in the region is tourism. One can spend hours in the towns of Windermere, Ambleside, Penrith or Keswick just looking at the clothes made from Lakeland wool, sweets from Lakeland farms or drink the special Lakeland beer, brewed by Marstons. The only three mountains in England are all found in the Lake District; they are Scafell Pike (977m), Helvellyn (949m) and Skiddaw (931m). They can each be climbed easily in a day and very little specialist equipment is needed. If the weather is fine, one can see almost to the coast of Ireland from the summits.